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Phillips 1974 publishes statistical evidence of suicide suggestion later named the Werther effect

In 1974 David Phillips published evidence that publicised suicides are followed by rises in suicide counts, a pattern later textbooks and WHO suicide-reporting guidance call the Werther effect after Goethe’s novel. In the causal graph this event weakens Infectious-Disease Transmission, a driver that weakens Life expectancy at birth — an improving welfare path.

Phillips 1974 publishes statistical evidence of suicide suggestion later named the Werther effect

Sources: [1][2]

Read the full account

In 1974 David Phillips published evidence that publicised suicides are followed by rises in suicide counts, a pattern later textbooks and WHO suicide-reporting guidance call the Werther effect after Goethe’s novel. This Fact stores that modern public-health naming and finding. It is not a 1774 death register.

Context

A 1774 novel can be a literary good and a later template for harmful reporting. WHO media guidance still uses the label. Confidence on 1774 deaths remains low; confidence on the 1974 paper existing is high.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe is not the sole author of every later object, law, or museum label that uses the name. Shared work with courts, excavators, printers, spouses, officials, and later states does not erase a documented role, and it does not make an ancient person the signer of a twentieth-century statute.

Why it matters

Health-capacity path via harmful suggestion. Medium confidence on magnitude, high on the labelled mechanism entering public-health literature.

Who was responsible

Contribution type and responsibility level for each recorded actor — not sole-author shorthand.

  • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

    Person

    Direct responsibility

    responsibility level 0.2 · verified

    The 1774 novel supplied the later name. The 1974 statistics are Phillips’s. Complex reception, not an 18th-century autopsy series.

What changed

Fact → Driver → Indicator. Relationship strength orders the paths; it is not the observed indicator movement.

Evidence

The sources behind this fact and its verification state.

Verified2 sources on file
  1. 1.WHO — suicide fact sheet (media contagion / Werther effect)World Health Organization · High credibility · verified
  2. 2.Phillips 1974 — suggestion and suicide (Werther effect)PubMed / American Sociological Review · High credibility · verified
What the sources establish

PubMed’s record of Phillips 1974 and WHO’s suicide fact sheet independently document the named effect. They are not Weimar parish books.

Established: later science named a contagion pattern after Werther. Not established: a Factrail headcount of 1775 copycat deaths.

Later competitions, monuments, translations, UNESCO listings, and museums are not converted into extra lifetime acts. That reading is an impact-path choice, not a property stored on the Fact itself. Confidence is stated on the impact path. A later English edition is not a recovered autograph. If a number is not in the two records named above, it is not supplied here.

Causal path

How this event connects to drivers and indicators in the graph.

  1. ActorJohann Wolfgang von Goethe
  2. contributed toFactPhillips 1974 publishes statistical evidence of suicide suggestion later named the Werther effect
  3. weakensDriverInfectious-Disease Transmission
  4. weakensIndicatorLife expectancy at birth

Cite this page

Factrail. (2026). Phillips 1974 publishes statistical evidence of suicide suggestion later named the Werther effect. Factrail. https://factrail.ai/facts/go-werther-effect-1974

https://factrail.ai/facts/go-werther-effect-1974

Accessed 16 October 2026.

By the Factrail desk · Method: how we source and score · Last reviewed

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